EVENT COVERAGE

Event 5

The official results of Event 3 and Event 5 of the Fall Poker Open are now live on the Borgata Tournament website, and one name that you’ll see on both is Mike Hollenberg (Rockaway, NJ) who posted back-to-back Final Tables over the course of those two events.

Hollenberg was up nearly all night battling in Event 3, finishing in 4th place. He then hopped in the late starting Event 5 Omaha/Stud H/L event yesterday and outlasted a tough, near 100 player field to make his second consecutive FPO Final Table.

It remains to be seen if we will see Hollenberg go for the three peat here today, but one thing is for certain, no one in the Borgata is running better than Hollenberg.

We would assume the young player does not meet the “qualificaitons” to play in the Seniors event, so he’d be playing the Deeper Stack Event 7 starting at 11 AM if anything; and we will keep an eye out for him throughout the registration period.

The tournament took more than 12 hours to play out and it was Roland Israelashvili (Forest Hill, NY) who was the last player standing in the Omaha/8 Stud/8 Event 5. Of all the players, Israelashvili seemed to be having the most fun while taking chips from his opponents and his skill won out in the end to earn him the title along with the $11,051 top prize.

Israelashvili is no stranger to success. He has won titles from shore to shore including a WSOP Circuit Main Event and a $400 buy-in No Limit Hold’em event at the 2011 Borgata Poker Open.

The tournament started out slow with the limit format but the steady rise of the limits plus extra round of betting in the Stud rounds ate at the stacks. It still took 12 hours to play down from the 93 starters to the money bubble and it burst when Thea Byock was chopped up by Mike Hollenberg and Joel Gumbiner.

This was the second consecutive final table appearance for Hollengerg at the 2014 Borgata Fall Poker Open after his 4th place finish in the marathon Event 3.

It was an entertaining and vocal tournament throughout the day and the final table was no different. Players often had to be reminded to toss in their ante as they were too busy socializing with their competitors. It all came down to stack sizes and timing before Israelashvili earned his second title at the Borgata.

Thea Byock (Matawan, NJ) was having a good time but ran out of luck late. She picked up some big pots early and it was downhill from there.

She was all-in during an Omaha/8 hand with the board reading {Qd}{8h}{4s} against Joel Gumbiner and Mike Hollenberg. The two checked down the {5s} turn and {Ts} river before they all tabled their hands.

In a near unprecedented development, floor staff have decided to go hand-for-hand when they were still three spots from the money.

This happened because one gentleman was deep in his cups and was trying to milk his short stack into the money. He was tanking for minutes on every street in Stud/8 and prompted the action to keep it fair between the two tables.

They are running players out the door in a hurry in Event 5 and they are now one table away from making their money. There was slight confusion with the clock stopped during the redraw with some players forgetting they were playing 8-handed.

But all is right now and nine of them will be happy in no time. New seat assignments as soon as available, as long as they don’t hit the money while gathering the information.